Friday Random Ten with Thoughts on the Why, Maybe

Well, here we are, Friday again, and I'm back with what has become a "necessary" once-a-week update.

There's been some rethinking going on, it would appear, in some of the other theatre blogs, with the writers doing some self- and soul-searching about "why am I doing this?" or "what am I trying to say?" or "have I run out of things to say?" or some such. That's not going on here. I know what I'm doing and what this blog is about, even if I'm not doing much of it right now. I'm just being . . . I dunno . . . lazy, perhaps? At least about taking on certain subjects to blog about.

I have many ideas each week as to things to write about here, but the more I think about any of these ideas, the more they grow out of control and I realize I'd be looking at having to write an actual united essay rather than a loose confederation of interesting thoughts and concepts, and I don't feel I'll get out of the writing enough useful data versus the energy I'd put into it.

The purpose of this place is to be a running account of someone who is making Art-stuff and thinking about it and how the more airy nothings of abstract thought about the work become practicalities in the real world of actually nailing these delicate pieces of creation into being, often with clumsy, rudimentary tools. Including running accounts of what things feed the process of learning about and making these things - other art, music, words, thoughts that come in and change or expand the mindset (with the additional thought that writing about these things may clarify for me what they mean to me and how I can use them in my own work).

Now, as it's been months since direct work has been happening on most of my own work, these thoughts have been somewhat in hibernation. I've been focusing a lot on input, but haven't had much to let go with about what I've been taking in.

But as my "season" of shows -- that is, the four August shows I'll be producing/designing/directing plus the show for Trav S.D. I'm directing in November -- swings into actual production, I think the energy to write about the process (and related issues) will return somewhat.

First thing of note with the August shows is that I've postponed Spacemen from Space until next year and replaced it with a new, smaller show (currently and very-definitely-working-titled BBQ). Spacemen was just becoming too damned big to do in rep with the three other shows -- it needed a cast of 22, lots of costumes, props, projections, and set pieces, plus I'd only barely begun writing it and wasn't sure if I was on the right track, tonally (it's a hard line to walk, being both pastiche-parody and social satire at the same time). When I do a month of four shows, I think only one of them can be an immense, two-act work, and this year that slot is taken by A Little Piece of the Sun. Also, I was writing the show with a lot of specific actors in mind that I wanted to be in it, and many of them couldn't do it this year, and replacing them would involve a large auditioning process I don't have time for.

BBQ is a smaller piece that comes out of the work I'm doing with (and at the suggestion of) David Finkelstein. David and I have been doing our improv work on an almost weekly basis recently, which he has been videotaping for transformation into video-art pieces -- something he has been doing for years with several different performing partners. I'll be going into more detail about our work soon -- I wasn't sure if David wanted me to write about it publicly until last week, but he has suggested I do so. His own posts about his work can be found HERE at the Improvisation Forum on his Lake Ivan website, which includes, as the last few posts, some of David's notes to me on the work we're doing.

From the work we've done so far -- five videotaping sessions after several weeks of learning the process and rehearsing -- several good "pieces" have emerged (as David has noted, and I agree, all of the work we've done would probably be interesting in a theatrical context, even when we're not at our best, but only certain improvs, when videotaped, become interesting fodder for David to make a video piece from).

David thought one piece we created together thus far was worth working on for his purposes, and suggested that it might be interesting if I transcribed the improvised text we spoke and used it as the text of a theatre piece I would create, which could run on a double bill with the video that he would be creating. I very very much took to this idea, and when it became apparent that SFS couldn't go on this year, I turned to this as a workable alternative, as I have been determined that in my month of shows I present each August, one of them at least had to be an original play (in this case, co-original, but that counts).

So in the piece of video David is working on, he and I keep using a lot of imagery related to barbeques and sacrifices, so we've just been calling it Barbeque and Sacrifice as a placeholder name (I assume), but it's become BBQ on all my scheduling documents, so that's what it is for me right now. Right now I have the show down for 7 performances in August, but I'm hoping to maybe get another 2 in. David notes that it usually takes a few months longer than he would have to make up a final version of one of his videos (they involve many, many layers of complex, computer-created imagery, plus an original score), but it's probably possible to have a "first draft" video ready to be used, which is fine.

Ah, yes, I just mentioned scheduling . . . I sent out a first draft of the proposed rehearsal schedules for the other three shows -- A Little Piece of the Sun by Daniel McKleinfeld, George Bataille's Bathrobe by Richard Foreman, and Blood on the Cat's Neck by Rainer Werner Fassbinder -- to the actors cast right now (Piece is fully cast; Blood is missing one person and I'm waiting for someone I want to decide yea or nay; Bathrobe is missing three people, two of whom I'll have to do an audition call for, still). More conflicts coming in, and a second draft will have to be made and sent out by Monday. Not too bad, though, not like last year, which was a nightmare of scheduling. So we're moving forward on those fronts. I have to remind myself, so I'll do it here, to email Mr. Foreman and mention I'm planning on doing a play of his this year and just check to be sure he's okay with it and can send me the letter I'll need for the Equity Showcase forms (Richard's never seemed to care too much about me just deciding to go ahead and do a play of his, but well, I should check).

So, shows move forward. We have a first reading of Trav S.D.'s Kitsch in another couple of weeks, and it looks like we'll have a good cast for the reading that we might be lucky enough to keep around for the final production.

Also, I'm writing a new play -- David's improvisation technique has actually opened up the creative floodgates for me in a number of ways, and I'm using the process to write something called Fat Guy Fall Down. The basic "feel" of the play came to me while trying to get to sleep last week, and thinking of The Brick's upcoming Fight Festival, and wondering what kind of show I would do if I were to try and make something for that Festival (there's no chance in hell I'll have time to do anything for it this year, so I'll have to save the script for a future FightFest or just some other occasion). Once there's more to it, I'll post some of Fat Guy as it comes together. It's kinda nasty and seems to be an abstract intellectual discussion told through the medium of dirty little fistfights and bloody noses.

Meanwhile, back in the iPod, here's today's Random Ten from the the 25,299 tracks in there:

1. "Snakeface" - Throwing Muses - University
2. "The Under Assistant West Coast Promotion Man" - The Rolling Stones - Singles Collection: The London Years
3. "Dark as a Dungeon" - Johnny Cash - Unearthed
4. "Taboo" - The Cramps - Fiends of Dope Island
5. "Birthday" - Martin Mull - Normal
6. "Hot Plate Heaven At The Green Hotel" - Frank Zappa - Broadway The Hard Way
7. "Dust And Dogs" - Pere Ubu - Why I Remix Women
8. "I'm Not Here" - Syd Barrett - download
9. "No, No Cherry" - Frank Zappa - You Can't Do That On Stage Anymore, Volume 4
10. "LSD Blues" - The Golden Cups - Volume One

And three cat shots -- first, Hooker and Moni, once again, staring out the window . . .

From just a short time ago this morning, Hooker curled up against the sleeping Berit . . .

. . . while Moni sits on the nice warm radiator . . .

The damned cold that has held me for several weeks now seems to be loosening its grip quite a bit, though Berit is still in the midst of it. There are two shows I want to see that close in the next couple of days (Power at The Metropolitan Playhouse and Times:365:24:7 at The Brick), and I'm still deciding if I'm feeling able to sit through an extended piece of theatre without having an extended coughing fit, or causing great distress to myself by suppressing one.

I'm sure it will be fine when, next week, I get to see my first (yes, FIRST!) Wooster Group piece. I can't explain, to anyone's satisfaction, including my own, the silly and bizarre combinations of inner and external reasons that despite living here for 23 years, with plenty of opportunities, I've never seen any of LeCompte's work, but finally this important gap in my education will receive a tiny bit of filling . . .

Beyond Here Lies Nothing But all Your Love

In an effort to keep things active here by posting briefer items of mild interest that have come up for me . . .

The great former WFMU DJ The Hound, who has a blog where he shares some great sides from his collection, has pointed out the newest example of my beloved Mr. Bob Dylan's great propensity towards "Love and Theft" (as he titled a recent album where he collaged a LOT of quotes from various sources into new songs, including taking the title from a noteworthy study of minstrel shows in the USA).

In a recent post, The Hound points out that the free track, "Beyond Here Lies Nothing," released to the internet from Dylan's upcoming album bears a REMARKABLE similarity to the Otis Rush track, "All Your Love (I Miss Loving)" (featuring Ike Turner on some mean icepick guitar). Like, REALLY remarkable. As in, Dylan lifted the music.

However, as The Hound notes, Rush probably lifted it from somewhere himself (it's as much the SOUND of Rush's record that Dylan took as the music), there's nothing new under the sun, Dylan's song is great on it's own, and more enjoyable and resonant when you know the reference, and it's all part of a tradition anyway.

You can right-click, download, and save the tracks above, or follow the links to The HoundBlog and check out what he had to say, both on this and other music (and check the cool wax).